Student Spectrums

As a high schooler, I was devastated to hear about the most recent school shooting. The most recent school shooting has brought light to this ongoing issue when a 14 year old boy, Colt Gray decided to come to Apalachee High School armed with a gun. He ended up killing four people, two students and two teachers and injuring 9 others. After this happened the question of why he did this was asked by many people. I would say the only logical answer is that there are major problems when it comes to mental health, school safety, and more importantly gun control. 

When problems like this arise, the subject of mental health might seem to be a factor. However, an article from Columbia University’s department of psychiatry states that “serious mental illness, specifically psychosis, is not a key factor in most mass shootings or other types of mass murder.” Although mental illness is a real thing, some may believe that it is not something that makes individuals like Colt Gray commit such heinous acts. There has to be some other underlying cause, and in this specific case, there is. Colt’s father had gifted the gun that he used to kill and injure his classmates and teachers. This only proves that violence was something that was shown to him at a very young age and it has absolutely nothing to do with mental health. 

Creating a safe environment at every school is crucial in order to avoid any sort of violence. Many schools have yet to find ways to make plans and interventions to protect students and staff if a shooting occurs. Everytown wrote an article giving ideas on how schools can go about making a safe environment for students and according to them “School safety experts recommend that schools implement both access control measures, such as single-access points, fencing, or external door locks, and interior door locks to enable educators to lock out shooters as proven intervention points.” I think taking these extra measures can be very beneficial when an incident like Apalachee High School happens. Take for example exterior and interior door locks to give students and teachers peace of mind knowing that if something happened, they could go into any classroom and they would be safe. I also think that adding bullet proof doors could help although that is something not many schools can provide due to budget situations.

When school shootings happen, gun control is the one subject that gets brought up more than school safety and mental health. The US laws on gun control is something that many people think is too lenient and should be taken more seriously. In Colt Gray’s case, gun control is clear proof on why these laws need to change and become more strict because there is absolutely no reason as to why a 14 year old child needs an AR-15 rifle. His father told police he had gifted it to him for hunting reasons and that these weapons were not left unsupervised with Colt. According to the Gallup news article, “Majorities have consistently favored stricter gun laws since 2015, with notable spikes in that view after prominent shootings such as in Uvalde and Parkland, Florida, in 2018.” This shows that after every mass shooting happens, people across the country fight for stricter gun laws to avoid this happening again.

I feel like it almost seems as though the US simply does not care about the safety of students. It should not come to a point where parents have to fear for their children’s lives when they drop them off at school and students shouldn’t have to worry about anything except their education, not where they should hide or what to do when an individual like Colt Gray decides to come to campus with a weapon.

If our country does decide to take action, mental health, school safety, and especially gun control need to be major factors when making a change.

That is, if they want to take action, of course.